Volkswagen plots a comeback behind a seven-seat SUV savior

For Volkswagen, 2013 was a year to forget in the United States.

Total sales in North America were down some 7 percent versus calendar year 2012 and, if you know the VW Group as we do, this does not one bit sit well with the German home office in Wolfsburg. VW anticipated a rationalization phase this year due to certain products going off line and other key models – Golf VII and its GTI version among them – only coming available in mid-2014.

But Wolfsburg is clearly somewhat stumped by the length of the slow-up in sales. With VW's leaders sticking to their goal of selling 1 million Volkswagen and Audis annually by 2018, last year the group managed just 559,000. In other words, to meet its target, Volkswagen would need to add sales equal to Subaru's within four years.